


I can tell that we are gonna be friends

by dollsome



Category: Bomb Girls
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-28
Updated: 2013-12-28
Packaged: 2018-01-06 10:18:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1105637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollsome/pseuds/dollsome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Betty’s new chemistry lab partner is named Kate Andrews. She’s new at Victory High School, with uncontrollable red curls and eyes that remind Betty of a squirrel from a Disney movie. (Is there a Disney movie with a squirrel in it? It’s been awhile since Betty checked.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	I can tell that we are gonna be friends

**Author's Note:**

> Long long ago, [lovecatcadillac](http://www.archiveofourown.org/users/lovecatcadillac) asked for a McAndrews high school AU. :)

Betty’s new chemistry lab partner is named Kate Andrews. She’s new at Victory High School, with uncontrollable red curls and eyes that remind Betty of a squirrel from a Disney movie. (Is there a Disney movie with a squirrel in it? It’s been awhile since Betty checked.)  
  
Instead of jeans and a t-shirt, Kate is wearing a skirt that doesn’t show her knees, thick wool tights, and a green cardigan with even the top button fastened. There’s a little gold cross hanging on top of button number three.  
  
The cardigan stretches a little tight over her chest, Betty can’t help but notice.  
  
Not in a  _bad_  way, just in a – way.  
  
Betty hopes that none of the boys give Kate any trouble about it. There’s no way Kate could handle the sharknado of obnoxious hormones that is the male population of Victory High School. Ivan Buchinsky is already casting curious looks from across the room. Betty spent two weeks when she was thirteen trying and failing to make out with Ivan Buchinsky. She wouldn’t wish the same fate on anybody.  
  
Still, Betty can’t entirely blame him for being interested. There’s something about the sight of Kate Andrews that makes Betty feel completely confused about life. Unfortunately, when Betty is confused, it tends to come out in jerk.  
  
“Be careful,” she snaps. “You’re going to explode the whole room if your hand keeps shaking like that.”  
  
“I’m sorry. I’ve never done any chemistry before, is all,” Kate says, her voice weirdly jubilant in its nervousness. “I’ve always been home schooled, you see, and I don’t think I’d ever even seen a beaker until today; my father always said—”  
  
“Yeah, yeah,” Betty says impatiently. “I’m sure it’s an awesome story. Just pour, please.”  
  
Kate shuts up so quickly and obediently that it makes Betty feel like the worst person ever. Still, they get the job done, and that’s the important thing.  
  
“Nice work, ladies,” Ms. Corbett says at the end of the class period.   
  
“Gosh,” Kate says happily, like it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to her. Betty seriously hopes that’s not the case.  
  
“We make a good team,” Betty forces out, despite the six hundred levels of cheesiness in that statement. Kate smiles so radiantly at the words that it’s hard to feel like an idiot.  
  
  
+  
  
  
At lunch, Kate sits alone at a corner table in the cafeteria. She has a textbook open in front of her, but she keeps glancing up around the room with that same wide-eyed wonder. Once, she catches Betty’s eye. It fills Betty with the determination to seem fascinated by the chicken nuggets on her tray.  
  
While Betty pays attention to chicken nuggets instead of the new girl, Vera and Carol happily bitch at each other about nothing like always. It isn’t until Gladys shows up that things get annoying.  
  
“Who were you looking at?” Gladys asks, bopping over and stealing one of Betty’s fries with exactly no remorse.  
  
“Nobody!” Betty says.  
  
Gladys gives her a look that can be best translated as ‘girl, you crazy.’  
  
“I mean, uh,” Betty recovers, “Kate Andrews. She’s new.”  
  
“She’s adorable,” Gladys declares. “We should invite her over, don’t you think?”  
  
“She was home schooled,” Betty blurts out, then wishes she’d taken the time to find out something else about Kate. “She’d, uh, never seen a beaker before.”  
  
“Eesh,” says Vera authoritatively.  
  
“Why eesh?” Gladys demands. She’s going into Righteous Indignation On Behalf Of Her Fellow Humans mode. Gladys does that approximately five times a day.  
  
“She has Jesus Freak written all over her, doesn’t she? Look at that cardigan! I’ve never seen a cardigan with all the buttons done.  _Ever._  I didn’t even know you  _could_  do the top button.”  
  
“Vera, don’t judge people for wearing their clothes all the way,” Carol sniffs.  
  
“Fine,” Vera says, throwing her hands up in surrender. “I just think it portends freaky things, that’s all.”  
  
“No, she’s cool,” Betty says. She can’t  _not_. “A little rambly, but ... nice, I think.”  
  
“Good,” Gladys says, satisfied. Then she stands up and cries, “Kate! Kate Andrews!”  
  
Kate’s eyes about triple in size as she realizes she’s being hollered at.  
  
Gladys waves merrily. “Come on over here! Sit with us!”  
  
Kate tries to gather her lunch tray, her textbook, and her backpack all at once. It results in a lot of awkward fumbling.  
  
Before she quite realizes what she’s doing, Betty is up and across the cafeteria, taking Kate’s tray. Her fingers brush against Kate’s in the process.  
  
“I’ve got it,” she says, weirdly breathless.  
  
Kate smiles. The cafeteria lighting suddenly feels less super depressing and more like the world’s most glorious sunrise. “Thank you,” she says softly.  
  
 _Oh, jeez,_  Betty realizes, and just like that, she’s in trouble.  
  
  
+  
  
  
Choir is not the class for Betty; she signed up mostly because Gladys insists Betty is a “passable alto,” whatever that means. The point is, Gladys is definitely lying. Betty’s singing makes beginning trumpet players sound good.  
  
Mr. Riley has everyone take turns singing scales. It is, for the most part, completely tedious.  
  
Until Kate’s turn.  
  
Her voice is gorgeous: sweet and soulful and more confident with every note. She somehow gives  _do re mi_  an Adele-like intensity.  
  
Mr. Riley grins. “Well done, Ms. Andrews.”  
  
Kate smiles nervously and ducks back down into her front row seat.  
  
Betty is in the back row with Gladys and Carol. It makes her feel like one of those old guys from The Muppets.  
  
“Wow!” Gladys raves, as generous with her praise as she is with everything else. “She’s amazing.” She nudges Betty playfully. In a sly whisper, she adds, “Good taste, McRae.”  
  
“Shut up, princess,” Betty grumbles.  
  
“You don’t think she’ll go out for Maria in the fall musical, do you?” Carol asks nervously on Gladys’s other side. “Mr. Akins already said  _I_  was a shoe-in for Maria.”  
  
“You know Marco’s gonna be the Captain,” Betty says. She can’t help it. Carol asks for it on a daily basis. “And there’s no way he’s not covered in Vera cooties. You sure you still want to be Maria?”  
  
Carol looks an excellent combination of nauseous and pissed off.  
  
“We’ll stage kiss,” she says primly. “If we’re posed at the right angle, I doubt our lips will have to touch.”  
  
“Besides, Kate won’t necessarily be the Lady Macbeth of high school drama,” Gladys says. Giggling devilishly, she adds, “I’m sure we can get Betty to distract her.”  
  
Betty gives her the finger. Then she (not at all) gracefully turns it into a wave when Kate shifts in her front row seat to look up at them.  
  
“Smooth,” Carol snipes.  
  
“Bite me,” Betty retorts oh-so-affectionately.  
  
  
+  
  
  
Choir is the last class of the day; Kate catches up to Betty as everyone’s flooding out into the hallway.  
  
Betty means to greet her with some praise, but instead, all she comes up with is, “You ... sing.”  
  
Somehow, miraculously, the compliment seems to come across.  
  
“Oh.” Kate flushes. “Thanks. I love singing. I’ve never been good at much, but singing—I’ve just always known how to do it.”  
  
“The choir’s lucky to have you. Please drown me out whenever you can.”  
  
Kate laughs. “Promise,” she says. She catches sight of a poster on the wall. “Are you going to the dance?”  
  
“I wasn’t gonna.” Betty makes a face. “It’s just a bunch of bad music and worse dancing.”  
  
“I’ve never been to a dance before,” Kate says, all wistful.  
  
Suddenly, bad music and worse dancing sounds suspiciously tolerable.  
  
Casually, Betty says, “I guess I could ... take you.”  
  
Kate’s eyes light up. “You could?”  
  
“Not, like,  _take_  you.” For some reason, Betty feels her face heat up at that verbal triumph. “Just—um, I’ll go with you if you want to go. You know. As friends. You definitely don’t want to brave it alone.”  
  
Kate doesn’t seem to find anything totally strange in the statement, halle-freakin’-lujah. “That sounds great, Betty. I’d love to.”  
  
They’ve stopped at Kate’s locker. Kate frowns in concentration as she spins the dial; she must not have much locker experience.  
  
Betty doesn’t mean to keep talking, but hey, everyone wants to make friends on their first day at a new school, right? She’s just being nice. (Never mind that ‘nice’ isn’t usually the first word anyone would use to describe Betty McRae.) “You want a ride home?”  
  
“Oh.” Kate is so surprised that Betty almost feels guilty. “I don’t want you to have to go out of your way.”  
  
“No worries. I like driving. Where do you live?”  
  
“The apartments on Rowley Street.” Betty gets why Kate might feel awkward – it’s not a great part of town. “It’s all my mom can afford right now. It’s her and me and my little brothers, since my father ... well. He’s no longer with us.”  
  
“Shit,” says Betty.  
  
Kate’s eyes widen.  
  
“Um, sorry,” Betty stammers, mentally kicking herself. “I mean – that sucks. I’m sorry.”  
  
“It’s all right,” Kate says. All her sparkle is gone all of a sudden. “He—he wasn’t well for a long time.”  
  
“Oh,” Betty says hopelessly. They just kind of stare uselessly at each other for a few seconds, high school clamor filling up the silence. Finally, she asks, “You want to stop for milkshakes on the way home?”  
  
Kate perks up a little. “I’ve never had a milkshake before.”  
  
“Allergies?”  
  
“No. My father just didn’t like us to have sugar.”  
  
“What, was he a dentist or something?”  
  
“A preacher,” Kate says. That’s a surprise. Betty can’t even remember the last time she went into a church.  
  
“A preacher who hated sugar,” she surmises.  
  
“Pretty much,” Kate says with a nervous little laugh. Her attention is on her locker instead of Betty.   
  
“Well, we don’t have to—”  
  
“No,” Kate interrupts firmly. She turns back to face Betty again, her eyes bright. Even though Betty barely knows the girl, somehow she can tell that right now, Kate Andrews is being brave. “A milkshake sounds perfect.”  
  
“Okay then,” Betty says, trying not to look as happy as she feels. Which is a strange level of happy. “It’s a—” She catches herself just in time, thank God. “— ... friend adventure.”  
  
Kate beams. “I like the sound of that.”


End file.
